London – June 9th
Jun 15th, 2019 by rallyadmin
The flight lands more or less on time at Heathrow. Disembark. Walk about a mile to the immigration hall. Not much of a line surprisingly. And they have automated passport control.
Slide your passport into the slot so that the device can read the chip. Take out the passport. Put in your right hand for the finger print scan. Smile for the auto camera. Wait about 30 seconds and the screen says OK in big green letters. The gate opens and you move through.
No humans. No questions. No steely eyed stares. I presume that if the machine doesn’t like what it seems, you’re future will be filled with humans, questions and steely eyed stares. But not for us today.
On to the baggage claim area. A shorter march. We don’t even check for the bags. Straight to the baggage claim counter and ask for them to check on the whereabouts of our bags. Fill our forms. They check on the computer terminal.
Good news: they have located them. Bad news: they are still in New York. They didn’t make the second VA flight last night. But not to worry, they’ll be here tomorrow and they’ll be couriered to our hotel. Oh well, nobody seems to be terribly bothered by the news. Off to the hotel.
The next problem: hot to get to our hotel in East London. Stop at an info counter to learn our options. Private car? Too expensive. Bus? Cheaper but we end up god knows where in London and then still have to get to the hotel. Lastly, the Underground: price is right. No bags to schlep. We can get close to the hotel.
Another hike – this time to the Underground station at Heathrow. (You certainly do a lot of walking in this airport.) Ask an attendant for help working out the automated fare machine. He gets us Oyster cards that should get us through the couple of days. They’re RFID cards that you place on a reader pad to get through the gate to enter the station and through a similar gate to get out of the station.
Down to the platform for the Hammersmith line and get off at Whitechapel. It’s a long ride but there aren’t any changes. Soon were at Whitechapel. Off the train, through the kiosk and on the street.
We’re right next to the Royal Hospital in the middle of a very Muslim area. Hajibs on the women and girls and beards on the men. All the shops offering English lessons, money changing from middle Eastern currencies to pounds, restaurants with decidedly unknown foods. This is different.
We’re following the phone GPS that has us going back and forth until it finally settles down. Across the main boulevard, down a side street for a couple of blocks, Newark Street on the left. Two more blocks to the Vilenza hotel.
The hotel is right behind the hospital and is newly renovated. The young desk clerk is surprised that we don’t have bags but we explain and he commiserates. He shows us the room which is very modern but smallish. A double be and 2 pullouts for the boys. it’ll do fine.
We freshen up and the head back out to explore. Stop for a quick pizza slice lunch in Aldgate. Then into the Underground and head for the Natural History Museum. It’s overcast but not raining when we emerge from the tube station and walk he rest of the way to the museum.
A few hours at the museum and back to the Tube for the ride back to Whitechapel. A quick check of the local restaurants but everyone is pooped and we settle from some paninis from a shop near the hotel.
Back down Newark St, past the enormous porcupine sculpture with the quills that light up at night. Into the hotel room. We make it to 8’ish and we all collectively crash. It’s been a long trip and tomorrow maybe our bags will arrive.
Obi-wan
